The Ministry of Health confirmed that a number of residents of a village in Lordegan have contracted AIDS.
Following reports that a group of residents of the village of "Chinar Mahmoudi" in the Lordegan province were infected with the HIV virus, an official from the Iranian Ministry of Health confirmed the news, but called the claim that the virus was transmitted through a contaminated syringe at the health center a "lie."
On Wednesday, October 1, a video was published on social media showing a number of residents of Chenar Mahmoudi village gathering in front of the Lordegan city governor's building in Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari province, strongly protesting the role of the Ministry of Health in this incident.
Protesters say that the health center employee used a contaminated, shared syringe to test the blood sugar levels of residents of this village, which has caused a "large number" of residents to be infected with the HIV virus, the cause of AIDS.
However, Mohammad Mehdi Goya, head of the Center for Infectious Disease Management at the Iranian Ministry of Health, denied the news. He stated, "Of course, some people have been identified with this virus, but the transmission route was not through contaminated syringes."
He then emphasized that he could not inform residents about how the virus was transmitted, as this was "a confidential matter between the patient and the doctor."
The Health Ministry official's statements come as an Iranian judicial official announced the arrest of a nurse who worked in the area.
Ahmad Reza Bahrami, the Chief Justice of Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari Province, said: "Some claim that a health worker who worked at a health center used a shared syringe instead of using a syringe for each person when taking blood for tests, and that the person in question is currently in detention."
He announced that a legal case has been filed in this regard and "other officials are also pursuing the matter to discover its origin."
At the same time, the representative of the city of Lordegan in the Islamic Consultative Assembly called the existing reports on this matter "contradictory."
Mohammad Khalidi Sardashti stated: "All departments of the province and the Assembly of Representatives are involved in this issue, and repeated meetings have been held on this issue since last week."
The representative added: "So far, there have been contradictory reports, but suspicious cases have also been seen... The test results are not yet accurate and a definitive answer has not been given."
In May of this year, the head of the Iranian AIDS Research Center stated that the latest number of people infected with the disease in the country was about forty thousand people.
Source: Radio Farda
